We have already talked about four teams out of six who have reached the PKL-09 playoffs and how they managed to do so in our road to playoffs article series. Today, we will talk about another team continuing that series, which is, Bengaluru Bulls.
Bengaluru Bulls have been a very successful team in the Pro Kabaddi League since its advent in the year 2014. They have played the final of PKL two times and managed to win once in PKL Season 06. They beat Gujarat Giants in the final with a score of 38-33.
They lost the other final they played to U Mumba in PKL Season 2 by 30-36. They had to release their star player from the past 3-4 seasons, Pawan Sehrawat, due to some reasons before the auction. The players they retained were Mahender Singh (defender), Mayur Kadam (defender), Saurabh Nandal (defender), More GB (raider), and young talent Bharat (raider).
They also retained some domestic young players. They needed someone to fill the place of Pawan Sehrawat and they got experienced raider Vikash Kandola in the auction for a whopping INR 1.7 crores. They also got Neeraj Narwal, a young all-rounder, for INR 43 lacs who was released by Dabang Delhi K.C. before this season. The franchise handed their captaincy into the hands of Mahender Singh, who has very good experience of playing in the PKL.
Bengaluru Bulls started the season without their past yearβs top raider Pawan Sehrawat and needed someone to take the responsibility of the raiding department when came Bharat, a young raider who was retained by them. Bulls started their PKL-09 season with two close wins against Telugu Titans (34-29) and Puneri Paltan (41-39) and two losses against Bengal Warriors (33-41) and U.P. Yoddhas (37-44).
In their next five matches, they managed to win four and tied one against Patna Pirates (31-31). The reason for their wonderful performance was the rise of Bharat, the raider, as he scored a super-10 in each of those five matches and even took 20 points in the match against Delhi. Their defense was also performing solidly and not leaking any extra points. They then lost their next two league matches by a small margin of 2 points each.
At the halfway stage, they were looking really good with 6 wins and a tie from 11 matches. They won their next four consecutive league matches rather comfortably, thanks to the collective performance of Bharat, Vikash Khandola, and Neeraj Narwal. After 15 matches, they were looking the best team in the competition and the top contenders to win the trophy for the second time.
After losing their next two league stage encounters by a very small margin, they won one against Dabang Delhi by 3 points. Their team suffered a hiccup close to the playoff stage when they lost the next match pretty one-sidedly against Jaipur (25-45). Their dominant wins in the next two matches sealed the playoff spot for them and had a chance to test their bench in the last league game.
They lost it though to U Mumba (31-36). Bengaluru Bulls finished their league stage with 13 wins, 8 losses, 1 tie, and a total of 74 points from 22 matches.
They will now be facing Delhi in Eliminator 1 on 13th December, 2022 and the winner of that match will go on to face Jaipur in Semi-Final 1 on 15th December, 2022. If they need to win that trophy again, they will need their raiders to step up for them and would want the defense to play tightly and without leaking extra points.
